The present invention relates to a machine for making tobacco products.
In particular, the present invention relates to a cigarette maker, packer, or wrapper. Reference is made explicitly in the present specification to a filter tip attachment machine, albeit implying no limitation.
Filter tip attachment machines typically present an infeed end supplied with filter-less cigarettes by a cigarette maker, and will comprise a train of rollers departing from the infeed end, rotatable about mutually parallel axes, along which single cigarette sticks and filters are made to advance in succession, passing through a series of processing stations and emerging ultimately as filter-tipped cigarettes. From the outfeed end of the train of rollers, the finished cigarettes are directed into a packer.
To the end that the cigarette sticks and filters can be advanced through the machine and transferred from one roller to the next, the outer surfaces of the rollers are fluted, fashioned with aspirating grooves in which relative sticks and/or filters are retained by suction.
The aspirating grooves lie parallel to the axis of the roller and present a cross sectional profile appearing as an arc to a circle, the bottom surface of each groove incorporating a plurality of suction holes connected to a source of negative pressure by way of relative valves operating on a pneumatic circuit in such a way as will allow the cigarettes to be transferred from one roller to the next.
The task of supervising a machine of this type is entrusted to an operator who, in the event of any fault or malfunction occurring, will proceed to identify the causes and restore correct operation. To identify the site of the trouble and examine the causes, the operator uses a strobe lamp, that is to say, an intermittent light source of controllable frequency.
By setting the strobe at a given frequency, it becomes possible for moving parts driven cyclically in rotation, and in particular the aforementioned rollers, to be observed at rest or in continuous motion at low speed.
Should it be appropriate to record or document a given fault or malfunction, the operator will film the event using a television camera, in conjunction with the strobe lamp.
This manual type of supervision is particularly laborious, not least in view of the large expanses covered by the machinery being investigated, also the considerable number of electrical connections required for the inspection devices, which indeed can represent a source of danger to the operator, especially when working near moving parts.
The object of the present invention is to provide an automatic machine such as will be unaffected by the aforementioned drawbacks, and in which it will be possible to identify the site of a fault and examine the cause swiftly, accurately and safely.